


just to hear you in the dark

by galacticdrift (Ancalime)



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-22
Updated: 2019-04-22
Packaged: 2020-01-23 14:47:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18551929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ancalime/pseuds/galacticdrift
Summary: Everyone's posting them because we're all outraged and traumatized, so here's mine: an alternate version of the end of 4x13.





	just to hear you in the dark

**Author's Note:**

> well, here we all are.
> 
> I did some minimal massaging of the canon for this -- assuming Penny-23 incepted Julia to fucking let her choose for herself, assuming Q and Alice rebuilt their relationship but mutually decided not to try for romance again. All I really wanted was to write Q living and crying and getting some goddamn emotional catharsis as he and Eliot lie in bed healing.
> 
> Title from Laura Stevenson's "Living Room, NY," one of my personal favorite queliot songs.

Quentin _ran_. He let his swing from throwing the bottle spin him all the way around and his feet nearly slid out from under him as he scrambled, desperate to put as much room as possible between himself and the deadly, bright shower blossoming behind him. Part of his mind couldn’t help but find it comedic, in an entirely hysterical way: the idea of _minor fucking mendings_ triggering such a catastrophic reaction. Most of him hoped he’d gotten far enough away before chucking the bottle that he could make it to the doorway where Alice struggled against Penny-23’s pull.

“Clear the door!” Waving his hands as he ran, Quentin tried to get the other two to go ahead of him. If he could get to the doorway, shut it behind him – would it even help? Behind him, the cascade of magic hissed like static, like the roar of the ocean coming toward him, like a million dogwhistles approaching. It was so overwhelming and overpowering he couldn’t separate the sound of it from the feeling of heat behind him and the flashes of pain as stray sparks hit him.

“Come on!” As they cleared the door, Penny slung Alice to one side, back the way they came from, and he took the other side, hands white-knuckled on the edge of the door. Quentin only caught a glimpse of Penny’s face as he crashed through the door and straight into the wall beyond, his back awash in fire.

“Quentin, you’re bleeding—”

“Don’t care, we gotta go, we gotta go—”

“Yeah, we’re going, c’mon.” Penny grabbed Quentin and dragged him upright from where he’d staggered against the wall; he could feel warmth and the beginnings on pain on his back, his arms, his legs, even his neck; some of the sparks must have gone through his hair because the burned-cellulose smell of it nearly made him gag.

“Penny, let go—”

“Oh _hell_ no, keep those feet moving, Coldwater, we are _running_.”

By the time they made it a few steps down the hallway, the magic burst through the material of the door behind them, setting off fresh showers that made Quentin’s remaining hair stand on end in fear. He wanted to shrug off Penny, push him ahead to help Alice, but Penny wouldn’t let go of his death grip on Quentin’s arm.

Alice slid smoothly under his free arm, barely missing a step, and the three of them careened down the hallways back toward their exit: the mirror marked with Penny’s blood.

“Alice, on three! Onetwo _three_!” Quentin wasn’t sure what Penny meant, but Alice, smart beautiful Alice, must have understood, because the next thing he knew he’d been hurled through the mirror headfirst, hitting the ground hard with an involuntary noise of pain as he couldn’t quite get his hands and knees under him for a landing. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Alice and then Penny leaping through the mirror behind him.

Alice knelt by his side as Penny immediately swiped a hand through the blood pattern, breaking the portal, then vanished. Looking for medical help, Quentin hoped, as his vision dimmed. From the sensation of sticky warmth on his skin and clothes, he suspected that sheer blood loss was probably insulating him from the worst of the pain.

“Q, hang on, Penny’s going to bring help. Just hang on, okay?”

“Alice,” he managed, trying to smile. “’M glad. Glad you’re back in my life.”

“I know. Me too. But you have to stay, okay? You have to hang on.” There was a soft feeling in his chest at the panic in her voice. He really was glad they’d been able to get back to a place where they could be important to each other, even without romance.

“Okay. I’m hanging on. I just—gotta—close my eyes—” That was as far as Quentin got before everything went dark. He clung to that feeling of softness in his chest for Alice, the throb of his arm where Penny had pulled him along with bruising strength. He wasn’t going be the one to let go now.

\--

When Quentin woke up, he was in a hospital. His face was mashed into a pillow and for a moment he wondered at the strangeness of being face-down on the hospital bed, until the throbbing pains across his back and down his arms and legs filtered into his consciousness and reminded him just what got him into the hospital bed in the first place.

Next to the bed, Quentin’s eyes focused enough to make out Julia curled up sideways in a chair, her legs dangling over one side and her head resting at what had to be an uncomfortable angle. Though, in her case, perhaps such petty human concerns as neck cricks were no longer relevant. Quentin smiled.

“Julia.” His voice was raspy, his throat dry, but Julia’s eyes flew open nonetheless.

“Q, hey! How are you feeling?” She reached out and curled her fingers around his.

“Like I got—run over by a tank with treads made of barbed wire.” Julia made a sympathetic noise, her fingers squeezing his for a moment. Quentin felt something warm and bright spread through him from where their hands touched, and the pain receded into a dull, muffled sort of background noise. “Thanks.”

“I still can’t do much. I’m sorry.”

“No, Jules, no. You’re _here_.” Quentin tried to put as much emphasis into it as he could. “You’re here and I’m here. You could do nothing but hold my hand and I’d be grateful.”

“You’re lucky to be here. Penny and Alice told me about what you did. Another step closer to that mirror and you’d have been gone. You almost bled out by the time Penny found Lipson and brought to you.”

“I know.” Quentin’s voice was barely audible, even to himself. He could feel how close a call it had been; the weakness in his body, the tightness of scabbed skin and presumably stitches, the ocean of pain lapping at his mind, held at bay by Julia’s grace. He could feel his hand in hers start to tremble. “How’s – everyone else?”

“Eliot’s stable and recovering.” Julia’s gaze was _far_ too knowing. “Like you. And everyone else is fine. Once the bottles were taken care of and magic started to come back, Lipson was able to shore up her mundane surgical work and get him a little further from the danger zone.”

Quentin’s sight grew blurry. His voice wobbled as he struggled to get even a single word past the lump that had appeared in his throat. “Okay.”

Standing up, Julia perched on the edge of the bed, curling over him and making soft shushing noises. “Hey, Q, hey, it’s okay. You did good, you did so good. It’s okay.”

Sobs wracked him, his injuries straining as he fought to keep himself from thrashing too hard and tearing what he could only guess were a sizable number of stitches. A hint of worry crept into Julia’s tone as she kept trying to console him. “Q, shh, calm down, you don’t want to hurt yourself.”

“I know,” Quentin choked out. “I know. I just—”

He couldn’t seem to let his feelings out except through the continuing flood of tears, but when he found his voice, it was thready and wild with surprised joy. “It _worked_.”

“…Yeah.” And now Julia’s voice had gone a little high and wobbly as well, and she ducked down low enough to press her forehead against his temple. “It worked, Q. It worked. We did it.”

At some point Quentin must have cried himself out and drifted off to sleep, because the next thing he knew, it was morning and Julia had returned to her chair.

\--

His next visitor was Margo. He’d sent Julia off at some point to get some real sleep, promising to be liberal in the use of his pain meds and concentrate on healing. That might have been hours ago or a day ago; Quentin had no real sense of the passage of time as he drifted in and out of consciousness.

“I brought food. Josh has baskets of baked goods on every flat surface in the entire fucking apartment.” Her words were harsh, but Margo’s voice betrayed her fondness. “I think he’s preparing for when you and El can get moved back there from out of this hellhole so he can ply you with the physical manifestation of his disgustingly gooey feelings.”

“Eliot? How is he?” Quentin couldn’t bring himself to be embarrassed about how one-track his mind was.

“Doing better than you, Road Rash. I just came from his room.” Margo ran her hand over Quentin’s hair, fingers trailing through it in soothing strokes.

“Wish we were in the same room.” If he was going to be pathetic and needy, he was going to lean into being pathetic and needy.

“Don’t be such a nutsack. El’s getting out today -- Penny’s bringing him back to the apartment this afternoon. All he’s got to worry about is not flexing his abs; _you_ , on the other hand, are about forty percent ground beef.”

Quentin made an unhappy noise and turned his face into his pillow.

“Hang in there. You’re a lot harder to move safely right now than Eliot is. Tough it out another day or two here, and then we’ll break you out if they don’t release you.”

“…Okay.” Turning his head so he could see Margo again, Quentin sighed. “Thanks for the update. And for the food. And tell Josh thanks too.”

“Tell him yourself in a couple of days. Or better yet, I can kick him out of the apartment tomorrow and tell him to come visit.”

“No, Margo, don’t do that to him.” Quentin laughed, soft and warm. He knew she would, but he knew just as well that it wouldn’t help – him _or_ Josh, or even Margo herself for that matter.

“God, you’re such a buzzkill.” Margo’s hand stilled in his hair. “Would have been more of a buzzkill if you died, though.”

“I know.” And he did. Quentin remembered the mirror realm, the moment where Everett stood before him, asking for the bottle. He’d considered not even moving away from the mirror; it would have made his throw safer, more likely to succeed. It would have been…easier.

For him.

Margo’s fingers brushed over his ear and Quentin sighed. “You and Eliot would have thrown me an amazing wake.”

“Bite your fucking tongue.” Margo flicked his ear, hard. He saw her start to speak, then pause, and he waited. Patience had never been Margo’s strength.

“ _I_ would have thrown you an amazing wake.” Margo said, her voice rough. She fell silent for another long moment, and when she spoke again, Quentin’s ears strained to hear her words. “Eliot would have drunk himself to death.”

Quentin tensed. “Margo—”

“No, Q, you and I both know it. You _remember_ what a fucking mess he was after Mike.” Her lips quivered. “You think he wouldn’t be even worse for you _or_ me?”

“He—” Quentin struggled for words. How much to say, how much to guess. “Even for us, I would hope he’d find a way to—to persevere and move on, if we were gone.”

“Oh, baby.” Margo ruffled his hair. “You know I love him, and I know you do, but—we both know better.”

Quentin wanted to say that perhaps not even Margo _really_ knew, but at the same time, he wasn’t sure how much Eliot had ever told Margo about their alternate lifetime at the Mosaic. It was a conversation he had every intention of having with Eliot first.

“I’m just glad he’s back.”

“Me too.”

“Those axes, huh?” Quentin smiled. “Don’t know what we’d have done without them.”

“Yeah, we’d have been fucked without lube.”

After that, they sat in silence for a long time, Margo’s fingers continuing to slip slow and careful through Quentin’s hair. Eventually Quentin heaved a sigh and craned his neck to look up at Margo. “You can go. I know you’ve got other stuff to do.”

“You know I’d stay if you need me.” Margo’s voice was as soft as her fingers through his hair.

“I know.” Quentin closed his eyes. “Thank you.”

He heard Margo stand up, the hospital bed creaking and her clothes rustling. “Take it easy, Coldwater. Abuse those meds while you got ‘em.”

“I am. Julia made me promise not to be stingy.”

“She’s a better goddess than Ember and Umber combined.”

“Yeah.” Quentin nodded, a smile creeping across his face. “See you later, Margo.”

“See you, Quentin.”

\--

Some indefinite amount of time later that Margo told him afterward was about two days, Quentin pushed himself cautiously up to a seated position, eyeing Penny’s outstretched hand.

“You promise you’re taking me straight to a bedroom so I can get changed without exposing literally my entire ass in front of everyone?”

“I promise.”

“Okay. If you’re lying, I’m gonna push you off the balcony.”

“Yeah, I know.”

Quentin took his hand, and in a flicker, their surroundings changed. Quentin felt himself drop a few inches and land on a mattress. He looked around quickly, still somehow expecting a joke or a prank on someone’s part, but it looked like just one of the penthouse bedrooms he’d seen through open doorways over the past few months.

“See you later, man.” Penny flipped him a jaunty wave, then raised his voice for a moment. “Hey Eliot! Wake up!”

Quentin whirled around, hissing in pain as his stitches and scabs protested, and saw that on the other side of the bed he’d been dropped on, there was a shape moving under the blankets.

“…Eliot?”

Dark curls turned, and a familiar face emerged from the blankets. This whole time, Quentin had harbored a gut-level fear that if— _when_ — _if_ they ever got Eliot back, looking at him would bring back traumatic memories of the monster, but— _Eliot_ wearing Eliot’s face was so patently a different person from the _Monster_ wearing Eliot’s face that an immediate wave of relief passed over Quentin.

“Q?”

Tears sprung to his eyes at the sound of Eliot’s voice.

“Yeah, El, it’s me.” Quentin’s voice wobbled.

“Q, holy shit—” Eliot reached out and Quentin sort of just—fell over into his arms. Eliot was warm and rumpled with sleep, both of them a little shaky with injuries and emotion, and Quentin wanted nothing more than to live in this feeling of being wrapped up together with him. Eliot’s neck and the collar of his shirt grew damp where Quentin had started crying again, silent tears of relief and comfort, but he could feel Eliot’s breath hitching and the occasional wet drip soaking into his hospital gown. So they were even in that, at least.

For a long moment they were both silent, until—

“Are you wearing a hospital gown?”

“Yeah,” Quentin laughed.

“Penny promised he’d bring me straight from the hospital to a bedroom here at the apartment—wait, we are at Kady’s place, right?” Eliot hummed in agreement. “I thought I was at least going to—have a chance to put some fucking clothes on before I had to face anyone.”

“He probably wanted me to shut the fuck up about when he was bringing you here and decided to kill two birds with one prank.” A beat after he spoke, Eliot’s face fell, and he brought one hand up to brush Quentin’s hair aside.

“El? What’s wrong?”

“I—need to say something. I promised myself I would do it as soon as I could get you alone, and—here you are.” Taking a deep breath, Eliot reached out and wrapped his hands around Quentin’s, long fingers tangling with his. “I should—I should be sorry, I know I should. And I do feel bad about, um, all the—murder the Monster did when it was driving the bus. So to speak.”

Quentin couldn’t help but laugh again. “Jesus, El.”

“Hush, I’m in the middle of something. You can mock me afterward.”

“Okay.”

“So here’s the thing: I would do it again.” Quentin could barely meet the intense look Eliot leveled at him. “All of it. Knowing everything. I’d do it all again.”

“Because it was— _you_ are worth it. To me. You’re worth all of that.” Quentin could feel his expression crumpling and ducked his head back against Eliot’s neck.

“ _Jesus_ , El.” His voice came out small and muffled, his lips brushing over Eliot's skin.

“Shooting the monster was worth it to keep you from throwing the rest of your life away babysitting in Castle Blackspire. Even getting _possessed_ was worth it, because.” Eliot stopped. Cleared his throat, his fingers tightening around Quentin’s. “Because to let you know I was still in there, I had to—confront some shit about myself. Battle deep dark inner demons, unearth repressed memories, that sort of thing. And I had to face the fact that the greatest regret of my life wasn’t shooting the Monster, wasn’t putting Bambi in the dungeon, wasn’t even discovering magic via murdering my worst bully as a teenager.”

Eliot paused again. “Q, I’m not gonna lie, it’s a little easier to do this when I don’t have to look into your eyes but—can I? Please?”

He brought their joined hands up to nudge at Quentin’s chin, and Quentin drew back a little, just enough to look Eliot in the face. From just a few inches away, Eliot’s eyes and hair and stubble were—a lot to take in.

“Yeah, this is way worse, thank you.” Quentin huffed out a silent laugh. “As I was saying. The greatest regret of my life? Was turning you down, that day we remembered the mosaic, when you asked me to give us a shot.”

Quentin had to close his eyes for a moment at the impact of that, his heart giving a great sideways lurch. “Eliot—”

“And that’s why it was worth getting possessed. Because now I have a chance to give a different answer.” Eliot squeezed his fingers again. “If you’re still willing to ask.”

Quentin took several deep breaths. When it felt like he was about to pass out, he figured he might have been overdoing the deep breathing, and forced himself to start speaking.

“Eliot, I— While we were all still—other people, my dad died.” A small pained noise escaped Eliot. “No, it’s—it was going to happen, I’m not _fine_ , obviously, but—anyway. Julia and I had a conversation the day I found out. She said she knew the price of the choices she made, and she’d pay it again to bring magic back, even knowing it would all get fucked up like this. I—my dad was always going to die. Something else was always going to go wrong. Magic _was_ back, Julia was right, and I didn’t even have to spend the rest of my life minding the Monster. But."

It had taken time for Quentin to realize, even after that conversation with Julia. It wasn't until the Monster had lied to him about Eliot being dead that the overwhelming wave of _then what was it all fucking for_ had hit him and he understood.

" _You_. You were gone, El. For a little while there, I thought you were _dead,_ forever. And that was—I hadn’t _prepared_ for that. _That_ was what I couldn’t accept about the whole situation.”

The truth of the words hit him as he spoke, his voice shaking. “Eliot, I’d do _all of it_ over again _just to save you_. Even if we didn’t get rid of the Monsters, or Everett, or free magic.”

“…Yeah?” Eliot’s voice was tiny.

“Yeah.” Quentin nodded. "So...yeah. It doesn't have to be romantic if you don't want that but. You're basically stuck with me."

"Thank fuck." Eliot sighed. "You know, I was gonna be fine with it if you had moved on, but—I'm really glad."

When Eliot's hand slid up to curl around the back of Quentin's neck, the welcome familiarity of it almost made him start crying again. The fear he'd carried for so long, that it was a comfort he'd never receive again, seeped out of him, and when they kissed, the salt flavor on Eliot's lips was the best thing he'd ever tasted.


End file.
